How can ethical decision-making in organizations be further reinforced? This article explores the relevance of Michel Foucault’s ideas on art-of-living for ethics education in organizations. First, we present a theoretical analysis of art-of-living in the work of Foucault as well as in the work of two philosophers who greatly influenced his work, Friedrich Nietzsche and Pierre Hadot. Next, we illustrate how art-of-living can be applied in ethics education. In order to examine some of the benefits and challenges of applying the (...) art-of-living in the practice of ethics education, we discuss an example of how the art-of-living concept has been used in a train-the-trainer course on military ethics. We suggest that Foucauldian art-of-living may foster awareness of power dynamics which are in play when military personnel face moral dilemmas. (shrink)

Many contributors to military ethics from diverse locations and philosophical perspectives maintain that virtues are central to martial theory and practice. Yet several contemporary philosophers and psychologists have recently challenged the empirical adequacy of this perspective. Their challenge is known as the situationist critique, a version of which asserts that: situational features rather than character traits such as virtues cause and explain human behavior, and ethical theories and development programs are empirically inadequate to the extent that they incorporate virtues. In (...) this paper, I assess the merit of this critique and consider some implications of my assessment for military practitioners and theorists. (shrink)